No idea how much the bike weighs, but the leverage is from the axle centerline to the bike, which is longer than 4-5'. Looks like an 8ft bed, the bike is close to 10ft from the axle.

200lbs at 10ft is 2000lb of leverage on the frame. That's a lot to add to a slide-in that already has a fat *** (extends beyond the bumper).

 

He managed 24,000 miles or so hauling that weight. My guess is the frame was slowly working its way into becoming brittle... Also remember that these frames are designed to break in a collision...

And then it finally let go.

I own a Kenworth, and it has a double frame. It can legally carry no more than a single frame truck can, but it's double framed...

There is a reason for this... Too much flexing breaks things. Double frame usually prevents this.

 

Designed to bend, not break, but yes, there are two weak points built in to passenger truck frames in the rear. The first is between the bumper and the rearmost set of bed bolts, and is designed to deform during mild collisions, to protect the occupants of small vehicles impacting the rear of full size trucks. The second is right where that truck's frame bent, and is designed to protect the occupants of trucks from major rear impacts, like a semi plowing into you.

 

What are the actual details on this? I've seen this posted on multiple forums, usually to take a shot at RAM, but I've also read the camper weighed ~5,000 lbs and the payload capacity of the vehicle was nearly 7,000 lbs so...it SHOULD have easily been able to handle that weight. The addition of the murdercycle doesn't help, for sure. but still...?

Edit: Nevermind...somehow I missed the first post.

 

A half decent Youtube vid, made by owner of this Ram, going into all the details and showing the damage and "temporary repairs" would likely generate millions and millions of views ($).

 

I believe that 7000lb payload is for a regular cab gas. The camper is 4900 dry which is more like 6500lb when loaded up. The owner confessed to never having weighed anything. Also not that it matters too much but that is an electric bicycle on the back not a motorcycle.

 

One has to almost think the salesman at the camper place was glancing nervously around at his co-workers...when that thing left the lot.

 

Correct. This diesel crew cab limited blah blah blah ram was probably at gvwr the second the slide in hit the bed dry, nevermind loaded for camping with 2 passengers and all their crap.

 

Wow, I have loaded a ton of wood pellets on a pallet from Home Depot and got home with no problem 3 miles total. Now wondering if I did any damage. This was done once on my brothers 19 Lariat 5.5 bed and once on my 20 XLT 6.5 bed. Forklift loaded towards the rear then pushed the pallet towards the front with the forklift blades.

 

You didn't harm anything. His is a "One off" happening.